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Vaut le détour

Ah, Paris! The city where the size of your dog is inversely proportionate to the size of your purse. Le Marais, (or "swamp") where I dipped in my sample jar to check out the state of fringe theatre, is very much a district of the small dog. And yet, its medieval streets have a strong tradition of outsider status -- and were hence overlooked by the zealous boulevard builders -- first as a Jewish ghetto, and now as a thriving gay community. And maybe this edginess explains the dozen or so of small, well-supported theatres operating in a relatively confined area.

First, some of the theatre in Paris that, with only 36 hours at my disposal, I sadly didn't get round to see: Face au Paradis, starring Eric Cantona, who continues his mutation from footballer to actor. The irresistibly titled Amour et Chipolatas. And also a dark and harrowing play called Extinctionafter the novel by Thomas Bernhard, which was recommended to me by a psychiatrist in a café. Perhaps he recommends this play a lot, hoping for custom from traumatized theatre-goers.

Perhaps not surprisingly, my sample jar contained results that were good, bad and indifferent. And so, in reverse order, we'll start with the indifferent. Le Point Virgule is a well-regarded venue for one man shows, and Tuesday evening's offering was Breton performer Arnaud Cosson. The theatre claims to seat 120, but I can only imagine that this is achieved by patrons sitting in one another's laps. So, an intimate space, then, rather like cosying up in someone's front room.

The audience certainly seemed to feel at home: an informal mix of children, smart Parisiens and a smattering of stout mesdames from the provinces, clearly felt they could comment freely on the proceedings. Cosson's style of carrying on conversations with imaginary interlocutors, whether as a boulangère or a school drugs awareness speaker, was occasionally scuppered by their willingness to jump into his pauses. Often it was just a sort of comfortable commentary on Cosson's reflections: "Oh la!" or "voilà!" -- a very different style of heckle from the beery harassment of a London comedy club.

Cosson himself is likeable enough, and lopes round the stage amusingly enough. He does passable impersonations of French types, but I was at times not absolutely sure of the tastefulness of his material. Maybe I was missing a layer of irony. One of his numbers was a mock love-song: "Si tu étais une ville/Tu serais Chernobyl". Some things just aren't funny in any language.

On to the Espace Marais, where I witnessed the murder of a man who's been dead for 300 years: Molière died all over again, at the hands of his countrymen, in this staging of Le Médecin Malgré Lui. A limp and embarrassing affair, the show was full of the sort of strap-on physicality that passes for genuine élan in some quarters. In particular, the direction apparently demanded gratuitous scrambling up ladders to an elevated gallery, unencumbered by any promptings from plot. No wonder poor Sganarelle was spuming with sweat by the end of the performance. Every so often a stab of 'Pearl and Dean' style music was broadcast, presumably to enliven the proceedings. It didn't. I kept myself awake puzzling over who the spooky, frilly heroine reminded me of. I got it by the end of the play: Bride of Chucky. And at 38 euros, c'est le rip-off!

Finally, what a pleasure to alight at the Café de la Gare, where Sébastien Azzopardi directs his own play, co-written with Sacha Danino, Le Tour du Monde en 80 Jours. Inspired by the Jules Verne novel, the show is described as a "road movie" in the brochure, which captures the mischievousness of this cartoonish, pacey, seamless performance. A delightfully silly script is spiked with contemporary references, and some pitiless parodies, particularly of les anglais. I should have been offended, but I was laughing too hard. Even our own dear queen makes an appearance, her arm on permanent swivel-mode.

Such is their sure-footed timing and rhythm that the performers move like well-tempered parts to a single mechanism. Not a second is wasted: the ingeniously simple set contains a small stage-within-a-stage, which means the actors can swoosh the curtains across, like Superman in a phone booth, and change the furniture, or a costume, whilst another scene is being played out in front. Even those with very limited French would surely enjoy the expressivity and contagious high spirits of this show. Worth a detour.

Leader: The unresolved Eurozone crisis

The eurozone crisis was never resolved. It was merely conveniently forgotten. The vote for Brexit, the terrible war in Syria and Donald Trump’s election as US president all distracted from the single currency’s woes. Yet its contradictions endure, a permanent threat to continental European stability and the future cohesion of the European Union.

The resignation of the Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi, following defeat in a constitutional referendum on 4 December, was the moment at which some believed that Europe would be overwhelmed. Among the champions of the No campaign were the anti-euro Five Star Movement (which has led in some recent opinion polls) and the separatist Lega Nord. Opponents of the EU, such as Nigel Farage, hailed the result as a rejection of the single currency.

An Italian exit, if not unthinkable, is far from inevitable, however. The No campaign comprised not only Eurosceptics but pro-Europeans such as the former prime minister Mario Monti and members of Mr Renzi’s liberal-centrist Democratic Party. Few voters treated the referendum as a judgement on the monetary union.

To achieve withdrawal from the euro, the populist Five Star Movement would need first to form a government (no easy task under Italy’s complex multiparty system), then amend the constitution to allow a public vote on Italy’s membership of the currency. Opinion polls continue to show a majority opposed to the return of the lira.

But Europe faces far more immediate dangers. Italy’s fragile banking system has been imperilled by the referendum result and the accompanying fall in investor confidence. In the absence of state aid, the Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, the world’s oldest bank, could soon face ruin. Italy’s national debt stands at 132 per cent of GDP, severely limiting its firepower, and its financial sector has amassed $360bn of bad loans. The risk is of a new financial crisis that spreads across the eurozone.

EU leaders’ record to date does not encourage optimism. Seven years after the Greek crisis began, the German government is continuing to advocate the failed path of austerity. On 4 December, Germany’s finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, declared that Greece must choose between unpopular “structural reforms” (a euphemism for austerity) or withdrawal from the euro. He insisted that debt relief “would not help” the immiserated country.

Yet the argument that austerity is unsustainable is now heard far beyond the Syriza government. The International Monetary Fund is among those that have demanded “unconditional” debt relief. Under the current bailout terms, Greece’s interest payments on its debt (roughly €330bn) will continually rise, consuming 60 per cent of its budget by 2060. The IMF has rightly proposed an extended repayment period and a fixed interest rate of 1.5 per cent. Faced with German intransigence, it is refusing to provide further funding.

Ever since the European Central Bank president, Mario Draghi, declared in 2012 that he was prepared to do “whatever it takes” to preserve the single currency, EU member states have relied on monetary policy to contain the crisis. This complacent approach could unravel. From the euro’s inception, economists have warned of the dangers of a monetary union that is unmatched by fiscal and political union. The UK, partly for these reasons, wisely rejected membership, but other states have been condemned to stagnation. As Felix Martin writes on page 15, “Italy today is worse off than it was not just in 2007, but in 1997. National output per head has stagnated for 20 years – an astonishing . . . statistic.”

Germany’s refusal to support demand (having benefited from a fixed exchange rate) undermined the principles of European solidarity and shared prosperity. German unemployment has fallen to 4.1 per cent, the lowest level since 1981, but joblessness is at 23.4 per cent in Greece, 19 per cent in Spain and 11.6 per cent in Italy. The youngest have suffered most. Youth unemployment is 46.5 per cent in Greece, 42.6 per cent in Spain and 36.4 per cent in Italy. No social model should tolerate such waste.

“If the euro fails, then Europe fails,” the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has often asserted. Yet it does not follow that Europe will succeed if the euro survives. The continent that once aspired to be a rival superpower to the US is now a byword for decline, and ethnic nationalism and right-wing populism are thriving. In these circumstances, the surprise has been not voters’ intemperance, but their patience.